In Small Heath | Peaky Blinders

eighteen; old faithful

After more than four years of constant fighting, all fell silent on the western front, marking the beginning of the end.

Bash and the boys, including Alfie and his men, all went their separate ways the moment they came across a medical tent, Charlie's leg was half way on the mend but they couldn't do anything about Bash's loss of sight.

Or his now souring attitude.

Had the Kaiser not abdicated a few days prior, the ceasefire wouldn't have happened and the world would continue to be at war with Germany, but now - instead of the gunshots and explosions they had all been hearing for months on end with no such thing as a break, the silence was almost all consuming.

Evacuations were slow, painfully so. They took the healthy first, giving the ill and injured enough time to heal enough for the journey back, but they were all told it didn't mean they'd be sent straight back home.

Bash had been told directly that himself and those who worked under him, Jimmy, Thomas Arthur and Charlie, weren't allowed straight back to the Midlands and the reasonings why were kept under lock and key.

Kings Orders, they had all said, but that didn't mean much anymore. They were sent out on the Kings Orders and now they were being held hostage by them too.

"You seem..." Thomas started, facing Jimmy head on, "on edge, like we're about to be sent in front of the firing squad."

They were all on edge, itching to get home, for a shave and a shower, nice food — maybe even a group chippy tea they had all talked about many moons ago; with extra gravy for everyone. Maybe even scraps, if they've enough batter to spare.

Change was afoot, Europe wasn't how they had left it, Small Heath wasn't either. Nothing in Small Heath, was the same. The people had all changed, the landscapes, the laws - everything.

The King was in mourning for his countrymen that he sent to their deaths, but whilst mourning, he relished the victory.

Sections were being placed upon Germany in the bucketloads, enough to prevent another war from happening again. Whatever justice looked like to the beholder, wasn't worth it; not to the Shelby boys, not to the friends they had all made along the way, not to the mourning mothers - wives - children.

They helped rip people away from their family, destroying families just as much as the enemies had done to them, but it didn't make them any less to blame.

"Kings Orders, Thomas. You'd really think the King would directly order our deaths?" Bash replied as quickly as Thomas had said it.

As the sky began to bruise with clouds of grey and as the mist from the sea began to drift inwards, the group of men all fell back into conversations - none of which revolved around the King or his orders.

Charlie couldn't wait to sit in front of the fire, his dog resting it's weary head against his thigh. Thomas Arthur couldn't wait to calm his mind with a nice whisky from his fancy stash he'd been collecting for a decade. Jimmy on the other hand couldn't wait for a big old fashioned cup of tea with a slice of granny's cake. 

Bash's mind hadn't stopped whirling around like a carousel enough to think about what he couldn't wait for, he hadn't even noticed the soldiers enter from the south, and he definitely didn't notice them stopping right in front of him.

"At ease, Gentlemen." One of the men called out, and of course, Bash hadn't paid enough attention to stand up and salute.

The man couldn't really blame him, though. Without sight, and for such a little amount of time, meant that he wouldn't notice the shifts in the rooms, or the light fade as more people enter.